I am interested in the structure and mechanics of soft materials, and in various questions motivated by biology, in the spirit of ``biological physics''. There are strong synergies between these two themes. The research I carry out in my group is predominantly but not exclusively experimental. For example, we use (and sometimes develop) instrumentation: optical tweezers, microrheology, advanced confocal microscopy and image analysis methods. These are deployed to characterise dynamics both in colloidal (liquid interfaces; membranes; gels) and cellular systems (gene expression in bacteria; growth of unicellular organisms in microenvironments; pathogen invasion of cells, inclusing Malaria).